Anna's Story
by Sorcha Cooper
Summary: A girl finds out that she's not who she thought she was.
1. Trouble

Today had started terribly and it didn't look like it was going to get much better. She had woken up an hour after her alarm had gone off, giving her only five minutes to get ready before the bus came. After hurriedly pulling on the nearest clothes at hand, which happened to be a ratty old jumper that she had worn yesterday and knee socks, that, as she had discovered after getting to school didn't match. One was a particularly violent shade of orange and the other a drab brown. As if this wasn't enough, she broke her brush on a particularly stubborn tangle in her dark brown hair. So, hoping one of her friends would have a brush on them, she gathered her backpack and a scrunchie and ran out to the bus stop, wishing she had inherited her mother's naturally manageable golden locks.

Then, in French class, as she proudly reached for her project on which she had spent so much time working last night, she realized that it wasn't in her backpack. She must have left it at home! Now she remembered, she had shoved it atop the refrigerator with a collection of other odds and ends that had been covering the counters. And her mother wouldn't be home to bring it to her since she worked the opening shift at McDonalds's today through noon. Mademoiselle Klein would never let her forget this, especially when she had handed in her take home test last week half done and smeared with grease from when she had accidentally set a box of French fries on top of it. And worse yet, Mademoiselle Klein might call her Mother, who already had enough to worry about without adding her grades.

Of course this had to be the day that Rachel Southland had to taunt her about her father, or rather her lack of one. She had heard this one before but that did not mean that it hurt any less. Having had enough, Anna grabbed a twinkie and lobbed it at Rachel's face with as much force as she could muster. Not one to take an attack passively, Rachel grabbed a handful of applesauce and hurled it at Anna. Soon a full fledged food fight was going on, trapping several unhappy teachers in the middle.


	2. The Principal's Office

Half an hour later both Rachel and Anna were sitting in the office waiting for the principal to get out of a meeting. As soon as she saw Anna, Mrs. Thompson heaved a great sigh and said "Not again, Eruanna. Can't you stay out of a fight for just one day." While beside her Rachel snickered. "Eruanna, your full name's Eruanna," almost doubling over in laughter, "Wait until everyone hears this," at which point Anna shot her a glare that ought to have made her turn cold. "Girls, that's enough, I've called both of your parents… "You called my mother!" Anna cut in horrified, "but she's working." "I realize that," the principal replied, "but this has got to stop, I cannot have the two of you in my office everyday." Meanwhile Rachel looked just as horrified, though for different reasons, "You've called my parents too!" she wailed, "They're going to kill me." "Well, maybe you should have thought about that in the first place, Miss Southland"

While this was going on, Anna's mind was reeling, her mom coming here in the middle of the school day and meeting Rachel, she would be the laughingstock of the school. Her mom was kind of unique, to put it mildly. She acted as though they lived in the middle ages. And the way she dressed most of the time! Rarely did she wear anything but floor length white skirts. In fact, she could count on one hand the number of times that she had seen her in any colour but white, not counting her work uniform, of course. Anna could only pray that her mother didn't stop to change out of her uniform. Hopefully that would convey a normal enough impression that both Rachel and the principal could ignore her other oddities. For although the principal knew Anna pretty well she had never met her mother. And for some people that experience was mind blowing. For one thing, she wore her "wedding" ring on her index finger! Until Anna started school that was how she thought it was supposed to be done but there was no place that she had ever heard of where it was done that way. And she had even done a research project for her history class last year on different marriage customs around the world. This was the least of her mother's oddities. Eva, the social worker who checked in with them regularly said that something must have happened to her when she was younger that caused her to invent a culture of her own in order to escape from the real world. That was why she checked in with them every month.

When it was first discovered that her mother was going to have her they had debated whether or not to take her away for her own safety. Fortunately her mother had managed to convince enough people that she had been telling stories to gain attention. The social workers estimated that she had been about seventeen when they had found her although they had never heard a word about her "real" past. They thought that something terrible must have happened to her the way her eyes looked so much older than she did, as if she had seen too much. So, in light of what they thought must have been an awful past experience they had let her keep Anna and contented themselves with checking up on her once a month.

The last time Eva had visited she had taken Anna aside to ask her some questions about her mother although she had called it a personal evaluation. Supposedly, to see how her mother's health had affected her, to see if they should take her away. But she hadn't asked Anna those sorts of questions at all. Instead she had asked her a bunch of questions about her mother. Apparently, they were suspicious because, as far as they could tell, her mother hadn't aged a day since having her. So the social worker asked her a bunch of questions about whether her mother was doing drugs or ingesting any illegal substances.


	3. Arrival

The arrival of her mother cut her thoughts short-in her McDonald's uniform, thanfully. Only it didn't work as Annahad expected, for upon seeing her uniform Rachel leaned towards her and whispered, "Your Mom works at McDonald's? How funny, is that why your clothes look like that?" she snickered, gesturing at her jumper. "That's enough girls Mrs. Klein said, looking dubiously at Anna's mother, who did often have that effect on people. Her mother was about seven feet tall and had long, blonde hair down to the ground although presently it was wound about her head in a crown of braids, which was a weird enough hairstyle in itself. Anna could not understand why her mother refused to cut it, it was a pain to care for, as she knew from personal experience, having refused to let her own hair grow beyond her knees. She would have liked to chop it all off but her mother stubbornly refused to compromise, saying that the most she was allowed to cut it was to her waist. Anna had no idea why her mom made such a big deal about this, seeing as her hair was not pretty like her mother's, it was just a plain, dull dark brown mess that Anna hated and despaired of ever getting to behave. However, after assessing the look that Mrs. Klein was giving her mother, Anna decided she'd better intervene. Quickly jumping up she introduced them. "This is your mother Anna?" Mrs. Klein queried skeptically. "Yes, ma'am," she replied, remembering a problem that she had overlooked. Her mother looked so young that many people refused to believe that she was indeed her mother, saying that she couldn't be older than 16 or 17, certainly not old enough to have a 14 year old daughter. Seeing how the situation stood her mother took charge querying what she could do for Mrs. Klein. To which the principal replied by telling her mother all about the past conflicts with Rachel all the way up to the food fight. Seeing the expression on her mother's face, Anna gulped, boy did her mom look mad. After assuring Mrs. Klein that this kind of behavior would never happen again her mother excused her from school for the rest of the day and told Anna to collect her things and meet her in front of the school. Worried by the tone in her mother's voice, she had never heard her mother use quite that tone before, she raced to her locker and hurriedly grabbed her books.


End file.
